Chemicals in the organic lab can be flammable, volatile, health hazardous, and/or corrosive. In the organic chemistry lab courses at CU, we require that you know the hazards of all the chemicals in the laboratory. First and foremost, you need to know these hazards so that you will know when it is critical to take precautions such as wearing protective clothing or keeping chemicals from flame. We consider this so important that you will always be asked to look up the hazards and include them in your prelab notebook write-up, and we will put questions about chemical hazards on the prelab quizzes.
Not only does the CU Chem Department think that chemical hazard information is essential knowledge, it is a federal law (below). Whether you work in the medical field, photography, construction, retail store (paints, cleaning agents), painting (artist or walls), etc., chemicals will be in the workplace and you have the right to know what the hazards are of the chemicals that are present. We hope that the lessons you learn about the hazards of chemicals will enable you to work in a safe manner whatever your future profession.
Topics covered on this page:
This current topic, "hazards of chemicals," relates closely to handling of hazardous chemicals. Please read these related areas on this site:
The chemical hazard information for a specific compound can be obtained a few different places:
on the web
- see this site's Hazard and physical data for compounds page
on the MSDS
- see this site's MSDS page
in books
- see this site's Hazard and physical data for compounds page
on the bottle
- see below, under Chemical Bottle Labels if you do not know what the symbols on labels mean
Having trouble figuring out what the terms mean? Try the orgchem Toxicology page, or the toxicology tutor published online by the National Library of Medicine.
The two major systems of chemical hazard labeling are NFPA (National Fire Protection Agency) and HMIG (Hazardous Material Information Guide). Each uses the same color and number codes, but each lays the label out in a different manner:
The University of Oregon has a very good web site explaining these two systems:
NFPA system is also discussed at:
OSU, Oregon, and MSU have good (and different) descriptions of the rating systems for the numbers 0-4 for the health, flammability, and reactivity ratings:
| OSU | Oregon | MSU | |
| health | numbers, guide | numbers | numbers |
| flammability | numbers | numbers | numbers |
| reactivity | numbers | numbers | numbers |
| white (PPE, special) | NPFA, HMIG | NPFA |
You will note some differences in the explanations. The NPFA is concerned primarily with fire, HMIG with safety in general. Also, the manufacturer assigns the number value when they label and sell a compound, rather than the government. Therefore, number values will change from manufacturer to manufacturer according to their individual interpretation of the hazard. Some sites that list these numbers are:
Or, you can search for the information on one of the MSDS sites (start on the orgchem MSDS page).
"Right to Know" laws
The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) requires employers to meet the requirements of the Hazard Communication Standard (HCS: 29CFR 1910.1200). The main points of this HCS as they pertain to students in the teaching labs are:
The Organic Chemistry teaching labs comply with these regulations:
The links below will take you either to the laws on the OSHA site and to other university sites that explain these laws.
OSHA
University Web sites
Written for undergraduates, these pages provide excellent explanations of the laws.
This link is the table of contents, for more information click on topics like "Right to Know" and "Regs, Stnds, Codes".
This is a list of links which takes you to the OSHA site for the actual fact sheets. Of interest might be Hazard Communication Standard, Job Safety and Health, Occupation Exposure to Hazardous Chemicals in Laboratories , etc.
